The enduring cultural power of 2016's #IndigenousDads hashtag

Despite its critics, social activism was stronger than ever on Twitter in 2016.

In Australia, hashtags like #blacklivesmatter, #letthemstay and #loveislove dominated according to Twitter’s own statistics, but the country’s #IndigenousDads movement also had lasting power.

On Aug. 6, people began sharing images of their Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander fathers and grandfathers after a “racist” cartoon was published in The Australian newspaper, sending the grassroots hashtag trending.

Drawn by Bill Leak, the cartoon came on the back of an ABC news program that exposed the horrific mistreatment of young people in the largely Indigenous juvenile detention centre, Don Dale, in Darwin. Read more…